Saving Philippine Idol (Part 2)

My hits went through the roof yesterday after I posted my thoughts about free phone calls for voting for Philippine Idol. It was a pleasant surprise, and I received both positive and negative comments, on-blog and through email, about my thoughts on saving Philippine Idol. Well, such is a democracy, and I’m just pleased that we can get people to at least thinking about ways of saving the show, because it is a darn good show, and it deserves to be saved.

Philippine Idol deserves a Season Two.

I am no marketing genius, nor am I some word-of-mouth guru, but I believe I speak for a significant number of people who watch the show locally and are aghast with how it’s been performing so far. In this day and age, especially with the Internet playing a significant role, to not consider working with the fans is virtual suicide. ABS-CBN and GMA7 all know, to an extent, what kind of power the fans wield, and what kind of power word-of-mouth can do for an artist’s career.

Given that we know of certain legal entanglements that prohibit Philippine Idol candidates from singing anywhere else save for the show – even if eliminated, I imagine – until after the show’s winner is crowned, if you will, here are some other low-budget, high-profile suggestions that can raise WOM for Philippine Idol:

Join the media circus – and not just on ABC-5. Sam Milby was the big winner of the first edition of Pinoy Big Brother, not Nene Whateverherfamilynamewas. Why so? He looked good and he was allowed to run the gamut of media mileage, doing endorsements and TV shows even before the winner was announced. In the USA, eliminated contestants figured in talk show appearances throughout the week after their elimination, and not even on Fox. Constantine Maroulis performed on SIX talk shows after his ejection from American Idol. A contestant doing the rounds of TV and print (and not just the Philippine Daily Inquirer) boosts a person’s image – and that of the show.

Tie in with the fansites. Why shun the Internet? IfABC-5 were really serious about creating buzz for the show, especially amongst the AB and upper C markets (who have the mighty peso to spend for their candidates, since right now, there is no other way to vote), they should channel their candidates towards Philippine Idol fansites. Philippine Idol Updates, for instance, did an interview with Jhonalene Sison – the Voltes V Anime Girl – that got the girl with the strange green hair a lot more mileage than, say, Christian Masaga. Do the Google search. So tie in with the fans. Allow email interviews. Visit PinoyExchange.com and other forums to get an idea of what the fans think.

Make official profile pages for the candidates on MySpace and Friendster. You want to create fans? Create MySpace and Friendster pages for the candidates! In a world where musicians are dying to acquire fans, MySpace and Friendster allow free opportunities for the avid fan to get closer to the artist. Imagine how many fans feel closer to Drae Ybanez and Jan Nieto, whose Friendster profiles are pretty easy to find? I’ll tell you – A LOT. Maybe not enough to save Drae, but we’ll see whose career lasts longer between Drae and other singers – either on Idol or on other reality shows – who have more money to send votes in but less fans.

Stick with a time slot, and don’t mix sports and music! American Idol and the Philippine Basketball Association don’t mix. The fans are different, the social classes are different, they’re completely different programs with completely different programming needs. Separate the two because they don’t work. So enough with the shifting (and oftentimes unpredictable) time slots, and give people a set schedule they can work with. In the US, it’s Wednesday for performance night and Thursday for results; here, that may just work (because more people are home on weekdays). If you want to go with a weekend, I think a Saturday 7-9 (already an hour too long – American Idol is tightly edited to fit an hour) performance night is good, with a results night at 930PM the next day. Yes, it’s late, but I think people would rather stay up and be ready for the show, rather than tune in at 830PM and sit through interminable hours of basketball. It’s nothing against the PBA, but again, they’re two different programs with little in common.

Finally, something really radical, but a real possibility, if ABC-5 refuses to allow free phone calls: Two-hour windows for voting. If you won’t allow free phone calls, consider the possibility of two-hour voting, just like in American Idol. That way, time becomes the great equalizer. Those with money (and those without) will all scramble to get their votes in during the two-hour window, and increases the chances of those with more fans to get their votes in, versus those with less fans who have the luxury of texting the whole 24 hours.

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Welcome!

Hi! Welcome to the travel blog of James Michael Deen, or Ganns, to friends and family. Please feel free to look around, or visit www.gannsdeen.com to read about how awesome God is.

ganns, i totally agree with your suggestion that the VOTING PERIOD be limited to just two hours after the show. AI only has two hours for the voting period? Why did PI decide to extend it to almost 24 hr? And an ABC5 executive said that they don’t really rely on the texting votes for the show’s income. Make the voting period shorter to equalize those with money to those who don’t. Nobody can dial 3 mobile phones at the same time, right?

I just love this show. I don’t want it to produce a so-so winner who is definitely below the level of the other finalists.

I would just like to say that what you said will actually help the PI in general. I truly believe that if ABC 5 listens to your shout-outs (as well as the rest of the PI fans’ shout-outs ), it would definitely help in making the show better.

However, I am sad to say that I also believe that it will surely never happen in this 1st run of PI. Maybe in the succeeding PI, we might finally be heard, but now…. very much close to impossible.

Here is the reason why I think it will never happen this season: contestants already booted out from the final 24 and its supporters for that matter (that’s when the voting started) will cry FOUL… which means they would want to do the whole voting thing again. In my opinion as well, I think it’s not going to be fair for those booted out earlier when you suddenly change the voting process simply because they weren’t given that kind of chance… and that’s not fair.

As for the current season, we are actually seeing birth pains, and I understand if all our suggestions will never be implemented by ABC. On their part, they cannot just change the processes in the middle of the “game”. But if ever there will be a next season (and I hope there will be… I am an avid fan of PI), maybe not listening to us (fans and supporters) might not be a good decision anymore.

So in summary, I would just like to encourage people to continually speak out what we think would help PI in the long run. We are after all, really doing them a big favor. However, I also suggest that maybe let’s not put all our hopes that there will be any changes this season. –> coz I for one really doubt it would happen (even though I really want some suggestions to be implemented)

That’s it for me. Good luck to PI and to all your bets. I have my bets as well. Ü

** Disclaimer: All these are just my opinions. Not intended to disclaim or to disagree with anyone Ü

You make sense for the voting suggestions not being implemented this season – and like my previous ‘campaign’ to raise the age limit, it really is more of an attempt for ABC-5 to think about possibilities for next season, assuming there will be one. 🙂 I think, however, the voting process was already made unfair when Philippine Idol unveiled the voting phonecards the week after Drae and Stef were booted out. If ABC-5 is willing to give people more avenues to vote in the interest of fairness, I see no reason why ABC-5 shouldn’t be open to other voting possibilities if it will encourage more votes to come in (which free phone calls will do) or less votes but a more open chance for votes to come in for the candidate with the most fans, not money.

It may not be the best system: voters on American Idol, after all, has complaints about not being able to vote because lines were clogged. However, I still think that a window or free phone calls opens up the chance for the candidate with more fans (with money or otherwise) to get more votes in.

I also think it’s still possible, however, to implement a lot of the other suggestions to boost WOM for the show and its candidates. Now that the Top 12 are in the process of recording the commemorative album, there hasn’t been a better time than to go out and talk to the fans, either online or otherwise. The eliminated Idol finalists aren’t doing anything much – have them go out and promote the show online and offline through media opportunities. There’s no recorded exit interview on P.I., unlike A.I., for instance; that’s wasted opportunity right there.

Plus, with eight weeks to go, ideally, they still need to address their scheduling problems. The voting system, perhaps, may be beyond help for this season, but we can still work towards making the show more popular.

I have a weird feeling that the people behind Philippine Idol are listening to what the fans suggest. The problem is that medyo too late na siya, kasi when they were developing Philippine Idol they were too idealistic and forgot the pragmatic aspects of the show. Halimbawa, gumastos sila ng milyones para magtayo ng stage, pero kinalimutan namang gawing DIGITAL ang audio ng ABC o palakasin ang signal man lang. They have the King of Rap and Asia’s Queen of Songs as judges, pero hanggang “title” lang pala ang dala nila sa judges’ table. (Arnel Ignacio for PI judge!)

As I have said, I think PI is listening to the pulse of its fans (but obviously they were not swayed by the suggestions most of the time). When Philippine Idol Updates suggested to ban the phrase “I hope to see you next week,” we haven’t heard of it eversince. Pero when the fans suggested that PI should stop emphasizing na worthless ang mga judges sa competition (at meron naman talaga), wala lang.

empress, I agree with Rewind that Philippine Idol is really experiencing birth pains. Hopefully, in Season 2, should there be one, they’ll be a little more open to ‘audience participation,’ in the sense that there are many other ways to get POSITIVE word-of-mouth going. Sadly, I don’t think they’ll replace the judges (although I really hope they do, at least for Pilita Corrales, because I really do think her comments are self-centered and nonsensical; she makes Paula Abdul sound absolutely brilliant).

Shy: Let’s face it, ABC-5 has been a little inconsistent with how it’s been handling PI, but hopefully, they’ll get it together for next season, assuming people will still stick around for it. It wouldn’t be the first time ABC-5 has screwed up an international franchise (remember all the game shows it licensed at the height of the game show craze a few years back?).

Idol_Fanatic, thanks for your comments on each of my comments. They’re much appreciated.

I so totally agree with you. At first I thought Pilita was going to be a reputable judge. But after watching her shamelessly flirt with virtually every guy contestant, and not to mention all the sexual innuendo with Ryan A…I would rather take drugged, stoned, and oblivious Paula Abdul any day!

Ganns, and to the rest of those who have been heard by ABC, congratulations!

I really didn’t expect this change to happen soooo soon! But it is a welcome change.

Anyway, what I’m worried about now is how the fans of Drae, Stef and Reymond will react / feel to this change. I know very much that this would really silence the critics in terms of the voting process (well I guess some of them), but I feel that there will be smoke somewhere else. These past few hours, I have seen in chat forums the outrage of the fans of these 3 idol hopefuls eliminated. They have been saying their bets didn’t have the same opportunity or their bets could have still been in the running.

I don’t know. I guess you really just can’t appease everybody. There will always be someone that you will not consider. But hey, that’s the beauty (or weirdness) of life.